


Destiny and chicken

by Liaeling



Category: Merlin (TV) RPF
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-14
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-25 10:59:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/638180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liaeling/pseuds/Liaeling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bradley knew the end was coming, and he knew he had to enjoy his last days as Arthur. That  meant helping Colin with his last challenge as Merlin. To fulfill it or not… well, at least the ride had been fun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Destiny and chicken

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! This is my first fic ever on this fandom, so please be kind to me lol  
> Special thanks to Colin and Bradley for being so terribly adorable together.

The moment Bradley read the script; he knew the time had come.  
  
In the great adventure of ‘acting’ there were things you had to learn and things you had to unlearn, but a real good actor never backed down from the new challenges. Colin was definitely one of the best actors he’d ever met, and probably will ever meet, but this time around Bradley knew he had to learn a couple of things to nail that particular scene. Maybe not learn, simply acquire the skill. Bradley had always carried the physical side of acting in his role as Arthur, but this scene, this scene presented a challenge to Colin. Not emotional, not of endurance or mind strength, it was _physical_.

And hell, Bradley was definitely going to help him overcome the challenge if he could.

He dropped the script on his bed, silently chuckling in anticipation.

The time had come for an intervention.

 

**\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------**

 

The producers had been kind this time around. They had actually given them a choice as to their last lodgings in Cardiff.

Katie and Angel decided to rent a small house close to the sea. Easier to spot Welsh men they had said. Bradley never knew if they were joking or not. Didn’t really want to know.  
  
Eoin, Adetomiwa, Tom, Rupert and the recently-acquired Alex (as Eoin named him on his first week) had chosen a slightly bigger house not that far away from the one Katie and Angel had chosen. They claimed they loved the Welsh sunset upon the sea. Bradley knew they meant ‘girls’ instead of sunset and ‘us’ instead of the sea.

Bradley had been there when the guys decided upon the house. He really wanted to spend the last season with them, but upon entering the kitchen and finding no fridge, he decided he’d rather spend his last days playing Arthur quietly drinking milk in a small little room than having to walk 5 miles twice a day to get a drink of the precious liquid.

So, in the end, things had narrowed down to the core of the show, to the real magic on and off screen: Bradley and Colin. They were homeless and they started shooting in Cardiff in less than 3 days.

Colin, very politely as always, had declined to live with the guys. When Katie and Angel told him he could share with them, he just smiled his ironic smile and declined by simply saying “I’m not suicidal enough”.

When Bradley nudged Colin into the car and drove around town to “see if we catch the perfect place” as he put it, he realized he wouldn’t really mind if he found a small flat with a slightly less than decent shower and a minuscule kitchen – with a fridge, of course. He didn’t really mind being miles from the sea, or having to poke the ceiling with a broom to quiet down the horny neighbors upstairs. He wouldn’t mind any of it if he got to be in the same building as Colin.

Not the same flat, heaven forbid that would set Katie, Angel and probably even Eoin talking, but maybe just the same building. With luck, the same floor.

As they drove around town, he realized he really wanted to spend his last months as he had spent his first. And, to be totally honest, he knew he needed Colin by his side.

 

 

****\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------** **

 

He remembered those days in France, the very early days, when he and Colin barely understood each other, (for Bradley it had been Colin’s accent and humor, and for Colin it had been Bradley’s necessity to bully him and/or get his attention). They had got side by side hotel rooms and at first it hadn’t meant anything.

They went to work, they came back exhausted and slept as much they could. It wouldn’t have been different if they had lived in different planets.

But after less than a month of crappy French TV and horribly stuffing summer nights, their down time had become boring. Without friends, without so much as an English-speaking stranger, they had begun to hang around each other’s rooms.

At first they simply met, by accident, in the hall when they both decided to take some fresh air, because definitely the one coming from the French windows wasn’t fresh. They met in the hall, realized the air was not fresh _anywhere_ near them and decided to sit on the floor (“Hotel rooms and their bloody carpets” was Bradley’s logic, seconded by Colin) and drink water to keep themselves from dehydrating.

It had been the first night they had truly talked. Not about anything particularly profound, Bradley had trouble deciphering half of Colin’s words, but they had casually chatted.

Several degrees less and days later, Bradley had knocked on Colin’s door. The chat on the hall had been way better than bad French TV, so when Colin opened the door to look surprised at finding his own personal bully (Colin knew it was just Bradley’s way of trying to make him open up. But really, he felt in high school all over again sometimes) standing there, with a glass of milk and a face that screamed “BORED!”, he had to smile and step back to let Bradley in.

At first it had been awkward (“Please, sit down”, “Sure, but I hate carpets”, “Maybe on the bed?”, “Did you just say ‘Baby on the bead’?”) but after settling down on the bed, back against the headboard and a considerate space between them, they had silently watched TV. Silently for about 5 minutes, because Bradley had begun to translate the main character’s lines and Colin had joined in about 2 minutes later, finding it extremely difficult to keep a straight face all along.

By the end of the movie, they had tears in their eyes and their lungs hurt after laughing so hard at themselves. It had been a crappy movie and they transformed it into a master piece worth Cannes, but honestly, why Cannes? Why did everything have to be French these days? They were English and they would not bow down! (Bradley’s words)

After that, their downtime had transformed from ‘Crappy French TV’ to ‘Crappy French TV with amazing voiceover translators’ and from ‘Stuffing summer nights’ to ‘Bloody suffocating summer nights to plan evil plans against Angel and Katie’.

Spiders had become an entertainment for Bradley, and a chance to save a species, therefore the world, to Colin. Simple sheets of paper became new possible signs for Angel’s hotel room door and, at the same time, a chance to practice their bad French.

Before they knew it, Bradley had stopped misunderstanding Colin’s accent and Colin had stopped being bullied by Bradley. As to Colin’s humor, Bradley realized it wasn’t that twisted, or if it was, he kind of understood it and… weirdly enough, began to share it.

From hotel halls to hotel rooms, from medieval castles to ancient forests, they had found a middle ground. And oddly enough, they truly enjoyed it.

 

****\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------** **

 

“What do you think about that?”

Bradley had to blink three times to process the words. He had been lost in memories of French nights.

“About what?” he asked nonchalantly.

Colin smiled his little smile, the “Bradley smile” as Katie had named it once.

“About that building. The one I asked you to stop for, and the reason why you parked here.”

“Oh, the building.” Bradley hadn’t even realized he parked, but these days he found himself doing things without thinking about them, especially if Colin so much as mentioned it.

“It’s nice, isn’t it? The neighborhood seems calm and it’s not that far away from the sea, besides it looks like it’s empty and waiting for new tenants.”

Colin had a way of talking, Bradley had always thought that. Not convincing, but more like… charming.

“Let’s go and see if we can find someone we can talk to.” Bradley said as he turned to look at Colin, only to find him smiling.

If he didn’t know him better, he’d said he had planned it all along.

 

****\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------** **

 

Two days later, they both had their flats. They were side by side, they both had a fridge, and a door connected them from living room to living room.

Bradley couldn’t ask for more than that.

 

****\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------** **

Colin had been about to start reading the script, the first part of the finale. He wanted to read it, but somehow it just lay there and he couldn’t reach out for it. How quickly it had come, and at the same time, how slowly.

If he could describe his Merlin experience, he’d describe it as a rollercoaster. Like the one in Parc Astérix, the one he and Bradley had decided to ride on the first row of seats. Up and down it went, and sometimes even around, and all along he had shared the ride with Bradley. A screaming Bradley to be more precise. Not that different from real life, then.

He had met so many people and done so many things and it had been the best ride of his life.

He just couldn’t believe it was ending. Slowly and violently, the end was coming. He wasn’t sure he was ready for it, for the goodbye.

He still didn’t know what Johnny and Julian had done to the final two episodes, but he really wanted to believe they ended it in a good way. They deserved a proper goodbye.

Goodbyes are always hard, but he still hoped this one wouldn’t be extremely hard.

There was a knock on the door. Once, twice, half a second of silence and another knock again.

He knew that pattern. And even if he hadn’t learnt it after 4 years, who else would come visit him at two in the morning?

He smiled to himself. They had seen each other for 12 hours straight and he still had to knock at two a.m.

_Typical Bradley._

“Who is it?” he almost sang, jokingly.

“It is destiny, my love.”

Colin had to contain his laughter. Oh yes, typical Bradley all right. He knew it would only take him 5 seconds to finish his line.

“Destiny and chicken.”

Colin tutted as he got up, walking slowly towards the door. He had to pause before turning the doorknob to find the next lines in his memory. He had watched that episode not that long ago. He could do it.

He allowed himself a silent laugh before turning the doorknob.

“What a beautiful combination, eh? Beans are a little cold, but the meat is very good.” Bradley said with a stoic face. No sudden bark of a laugh then. Ok, Colin could manage that.

“Go _away_ ” he responded, without even a bat of eyelashes.

“My love, I do not know what I’ve done to offend you.” Bradley even looked apologetic. He was a good actor, Colin had to give him that.

“Your love? Not now, not ever! For I am vegetarian and you do not know the difference between salad and pasture.”

That did it. Bradley threw his head back and laughed his high pitched laugh. Colin joined him with his throaty laugh and turned around, knowing full well that Bradley would follow him into his flat.

Colin threw himself upon the sofa, only to be joined by a still laughing Bradley seconds later. Between laughter, he turned to him.

“No, really, it is destiny!”

“Honestly Bradley, if you start all over again I’ll-“

“No, no, no! Have you read the script yet?”

“Ehm… no. Please tell me Agravaine doesn’t come back from the death to clothe the bad guys in black.”

Bradley laughed again at this, but after a couple of seconds, erased all trace of hilarity from his face and added in a serious tone. “It’s a new challenge, not for Merlin, but for you Colin. And I’m willing to help you with it.”

Colin looked at Bradley quizzically. This was interesting. He was either being vague about the plot or actually exposing the truth.

“If I knew what it was, I’d probably say no.”

“I’m not joking, Col! I’m here for an intervention.”

Suddenly, Bradley reached across the sofa, disregarding all personal space as always. For a moment, Colin thought alarmingly that Bradley would start tickling him, like the counted times he did in the past (and ended bruised by pointy knees in places he’d rather not name). A moment later, Colin realized he was simply reaching for the script on top of the end table.

He opened the script, clicking his tongue in the process (and no, Colin did not think he looked cute doing this) and finally found the page he was clearly looking for.

“Here, I think you know what happened before that. The battle, Mordred is a sneaky traitor, lack of blood on screen because it’s a family show, blah blah, but the important part is this.” he said as he handed Colin the script, pointing to a particular line of text.

It took Colin three seconds to read it. It took him five to understand it and ten to react to Bradley’s raised eyebrows.

“But I can’t carry you, you’re fat!” he exclaimed without really thinking.

The next ten minutes were a blur for Colin. Bradley did tickle him in the end, and he did get kneed in inconvenient places a couple of times, but between laughter and screams of “I’M NOT FAT! I’M FIGHTING FIT! Or football fit, or whatever”, Colin realized that his last months of shooting were definitely the best. And in all honestly, he wouldn’t mind shooting five more seasons if it meant getting a knock on the door at 2 a.m. only to be offered chicken.

Fifteen minutes had passed and Colin and Bradley had ended on the floor, right in the middle of Colin’s carpet (which Bradley hated with all his being, but secretly thought comfy), still laughing between raspy breaths.

The silence was comfortable after all the fumbling and stumbling and Colin thought he might look a little bit demented with the smile stuck on his face. As he turned to look at Bradley, only to find him smiling in the same way, he realized he wasn’t the only demented one.

Bradley felt Colin’s gaze upon him and turned. Their eyes met and they both smiled even wider. Suddenly, Bradley whispered with the same demented smile still upon his face.

“You’ll get muscle innervation through my intervention.”

 

****\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------** **

 

If the producers told Colin on the last day of filming to take anything with him, anything at all from the Merlin set, he wouldn’t take anything.

He wouldn’t take a neckerchief, nor his boots, not even a cool prop.

He would take the memories. He would the smiles and the laughter. He would take the “You really are a clotpole, Bradley” and the “Race you to the top of the castle, Professor Morgan”. He would take the crappy French TV with amazing voiceover translators and the changed signs on Angel’s hotel room door. He would take the songs he and Bradley made up, and the countless hours spend watching Buffy just to throw a random line at Tony the next day on set. He would definitely take the days off spent running lines with a David Bowie-voiced Bradley and the wrap parties when he actually drank some alcohol (and entertained everyone). He would take the time they went to the movies and the time when Bradley dragged him around a French town looking for milk. He would even take the time spent in the gym with a weird blonde guy (“It’s James. Bradley James, Col”), because he was “too scrawny to carry the football fit perfection of this man”.

He would take all of that with him, along with the key to his last flat. The one were Bradley ushered in without even knocking, through the connecting door in the living room. The one were Bradley cooked for him a recipe he found on the internet (“Rabbit food for the rabbit toothed, Cols”). The one were Bradley turned on the TV and watched a documentary on koalas only to turn to Colin and nickname him “Koala-Col”. The one were Bradley told him, in the most honest night of their lives, how much he liked spending time with him and how much he had learned from him, and what a wonderful time they had being Arthur and Merlin.

And maybe, if he was lucky, he could take something else with him.

But not a prop, not a neckerchief, not boots. If he was lucky, maybe he could take the one that started as a bully and ended as his best friend.

And if he wasn’t lucky enough, he could always wait for an intervention. He could always wait for destiny.

And chicken.


End file.
